Thermally labile goods, such as medical supplies, blood, vaccines and other biologics, must be kept within a tightly constrained temperature range during shipping and storage for extended periods of time. Significant advances in passively cooled shipping and transport containers have been made over the past few years by surrounding the payload retention chamber of the container with panels containing a phase change material. Such containers are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 7,257,963, 7,422,143, 7,500,593, and 7,516,600.
While constituting a significant advance over prior thermal control containers, the cost of maintaining an inventory of such containers capable of providing the various combinations of available payload, target temperature, guaranteed duration of thermal control, size of container and weight of container desired from time to time by various users can be cost prohibitive.
Hence, a substantial need exists for passively cooled shipping and transport containers capable of allowing users to customize assembly of the shipping containers on site to achieve desired combinations of available payload, target temperature, guaranteed duration of thermal control, size of container and weight of container.